Ravenloft: Prisoners of the Mist

Public (OOC) => Setting and Lore Discussion => Topic started by: RickDeckard on April 16, 2017, 12:29:51 PM

Title: How do non-Ravenloft characters end up in the Mists?
Post by: RickDeckard on April 16, 2017, 12:29:51 PM
I've currently rolled with a Ranger from Icewind Dales with a friend and we're curious about how typically people from different campaign settings would typically end up in the Mists? I'm not even sure how travel between Faerun and Ravenloft works. I've been able to work out every detail about her except for this, surely it will come up in future RP discussions for my character.

Any ideas?

Cheers.
Title: Re: How do non-Ravenloft characters end up in the Mists?
Post by: BahamutZ3RO on April 16, 2017, 12:32:14 PM
The person usually ends up in an unnatural bank of mist on their homeworld and then when they emerge they find themselves in the Ravenloft setting. It is, for the most part, a one-way trip.
Title: Re: How do non-Ravenloft characters end up in the Mists?
Post by: SanneJ on April 16, 2017, 01:08:26 PM
I use the intro movie and give it a (small) spin, like: you where walking true the back alleys of a city, instead of the woods, when a stranger who you thought was planning on robbing you clubbed you on the head and send you to a unknown land. or you where standing behind the steering wheel of your boat, everyone else fast asleep, when you saw the mist coming and sailed right true it, only to wake up alone in a unknown land.

You can of course also play with where you where going or coming from around the time it happened, like: you where stumbling with tears in your eyes while the village you where born in is burning to the ground, the bodies of your friends and family littering the streets. or you and a friend where send to the big city to join the faith militant, when on the way your heard screaming in the woods. or you stole cookies from your grandmother and making a run for it, your grandmother mockingly yelling in the distance, you tripped and fell only to end up in the mists.


(If some of these are ruled breaks, and only the server intro movie is what happens, please let me know and I will remove the post)

 
Title: Re: How do non-Ravenloft characters end up in the Mists?
Post by: Zwickelfaust on April 16, 2017, 04:55:16 PM
You could consider the most into a dream  where you wake up in a true nightmare.
Title: Re: How do non-Ravenloft characters end up in the Mists?
Post by: Mistwalker on April 16, 2017, 05:03:09 PM
Options are vast and varied.. from rolling mist, being a victim of a dark ritual, reading a book, doing something terrible to someone... calling a challenge out in the night etc.
Title: Re: How do non-Ravenloft characters end up in the Mists?
Post by: Bluebomber4evr on April 16, 2017, 05:13:37 PM
Back in the day, the folks at TSR actually did a breakdown of how this happens per setting.

On standard D&D worlds (Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Mystara, Birthright, and Eberron), it happens just as BahamutZ3RO described above: a bank of thick fog rolls in around the PCs and when it clears they're in Ravenloft.

Characters in the Dark Sun setting have a different scenario. Since Athas is a hot, dry world, there are no banks of fog. Instead, Athasian PCs see shimmering mirage of vast stretches of water. Even if they attempt to move away from the mirage, it overtakes them and they all succumb to heat stroke. When they wake up, they are in Ravenloft. (This scenario could conceivably happen in any desert in a "normal" D&D world as well.)

Finally, characters traveling in Wildspace in a Spelljammer campaign are not completely safe, either. In space, the Mists of Ravenloft take the form of a jet black cloud that appears in front of the spelljamming vessel. Spelljammer characters do have one way to avoid the Mists: the phlogiston, which blocks all forms of planar travel.

Barring that, there are a few other, less used ways a person could get to Ravenloft. Some worlds have permanent one-way portals into Ravenloft (such as the dungeons beneath Castle Greyhawk on Oerth or in the ruins of Xak Tsaroth on Krynn).

Lastly, there are occasionally conjunctions. These are a rare occurrence where part of the lands of Ravenloft temporarily replace a portion of the land of a Prime Material world.
Title: Re: How do non-Ravenloft characters end up in the Mists?
Post by: RickDeckard on April 17, 2017, 09:43:17 PM
This has all be handy information and I've been able to sort something out brief with my character's information. Thanks guys!
Title: Re: How do non-Ravenloft characters end up in the Mists?
Post by: MAB77 on April 24, 2017, 02:08:15 PM
Furthermore, while the Mists never reach out to snatch someone on the Inner, Outer or Transitive planes, characters from the Planescape setting can still end up in Ravenloft going through the wrong portal or through the Ethereal plane.